“Champagne sailing” is a choice expression which is in danger of being over-used every time a bit of sunshine happens upon a decent sailing breeze during race time in Ireland writes W M Nixon. But we’ve no doubt it was being bandied about at some stage on most of the 498 boats taking part in the Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta 2019’s third day’s racing on this very special Saturday.
So at the very least, we’ll allow that there was a Bollinger Breeze on the Bay, and if you were on one of the many boats doing well in the two dozen-plus classes, “champagne sailing” is definitely a permitted phrase.
The sun was around most of the time, obscured occasionally only by the most harmless of clouds, and while the very usable breeze was west of north in the inner bay, it definitely had a growing touch of nor’east to it as you got seaward, and the salty aroma of the real sea with it
This was very much to the benefit of the grand fromages in Classes 0 and 1, and the IRC Coastal Classes as well, for at some stage all were favoured with a cracking beat out to the North Burford Buoy. This workaday navigation marker played such a useful role in the day’s sailing that if it hadn’t existed, then someone would have had to invent it as the programme swung into action. And to round out the sport, the directness of the breezes in through the harbour mouth permitted in-harbour finishes which brought that classic Beechey painting of the Royal St George Regatta of 1874 gloriously back to life, so all was well with the world.
Effectively, tomorrow’s final races will all be done and dusted around lunchtime or very soon after to allow the marathon prizegiving ceremony the time and space it needs, so this evening we’re getting very close to seeing the final lineup for the silverware, and in a couple of classes it’s already all over bar the shouting.
The oven is turned way up among the profusion of J/109s in Class 1. Overnight leader Outrajeous (Richard Colwell & Johnny Murphy, Howth YC) logged a third today, but this has her only one point – at 8 - ahead of John Maybury’s Joker II (RIYC) which managed a first to total 9, while the Goodbody family in White Mischief are on 10 and Pat Kelly’s Storm is in fourth on 11.
Storm continues to have a clear lead in the RC 35 sub-division, with Brian and John Hall’s Something Else still second while Debbie Aitken’s First 36.7 Animal is also something else, she manages to hold third after a 5th today despite having J/09s every which way around her.